My friends give me grief because I read
a lot of film reviews and therefore apparently don't make my mind up
for myself. Fuck you, 'friends' of mine!!! I know you're only winding
me up but here are all of the reasons that the abuse you give me is
unjust. Firstly, I never embrace the points of a review as my own
without having already seen the film for myself and secondly, I
always go into a movie with a completely open mind. Also- reviews are
not as opinion based as people think they are. A good review doesn't
just explain what a person liked about something but rather analyses
from a technical or theoretical point of view the aspects of a film
that either worked or didn't. You could argue that there is still
some degree of subjectivity to this but there is obviously
significantly less than somebody just waffling on about whatever old
shit they liked or hated. Of course, occasionally reviews contradict
each other and so it is not an exact science but this is why I read a
lot of them. Not only does that give me a better feeling for the
general consensus but I also just enjoy reading both sides of an
artistic debate to see which side I'm on. I don't read reviews to
help myself form an opinion but rather as a guide to decide what I
should go and pay to see at the cinema. If I had the money or time to
see everything then I would but sadly I don't and so if I'm going to
piss away some of my hard earned cash then I'd like to see something
that I'm more than likely to enjoy. To conclude... My friends are all
arses!
Anyway, these constant accusations have
kind of led me to conclude that there are two levels on which you can
enjoy a film. On the one hand there is how well made it is and on the
other there is how much you actually like it. The first is slightly
more objective whereas the later is completely subjective. Generally
for me, the two tend to match up however there's a few Arnie films
that got badly reviewed that I still love for all the wrong reasons
and although I can see the technical brilliance of something like
Solaris, it still bored the absolute bollocks off me. I
mention all of this because when it comes to
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, I'm
kind of in that odd position where I can see that as a film it really
isn't perfect but at the same time I really couldn't give a solitary
fuck. Not only that but one of its biggest problems is something that
I love the most about it. Like the well used flaps of an elderly
whore ,this film is ridiculously baggy and noticeably longer than it
should be. However as a huge fan of this franchise I am more than
happy to anchor my arse to a chair, tell reality to go fuck itself
and immerse myself in the ongoing bullshit of Middle-Earth.
 |
| "You're awfully quiet behind me, Gandalf..." |
To quickly recap
the shiz that's going down this time... A gang of hobo-dwarves are
trying to reclaim their mountain home after it was repossessed by a
giant dragon with a taste for bling and the temper of a knobhead.
Although they're being mostly helped by Gandalf the Wizard, his mind
isn't completely paying attention to them as he distracts himself
with worries of a greater, sequel-baiting, evil. As a result he does
his usual trick of buggering off to sort his own crap out just in
time for his friends to do the dangerous missions alone. With
incidents like the walk through Mirkwood here or even the Battle for
Helm's Deep later on, Gandalf's dickish catchphrase is pretty much,
“This next endeavour will be most dangerous... So see you in a few
days my tiny peeps”. Bilbo is still tagging along for the adventure
however in what must be symbolic of a homosexual awakening, he is
slowly succumbing to the seductive power of The One Ring. Fans of
small people fingering a tiny golden hoop will not go disappointed
here. Dwarvin leader Thorin too is also starting to show signs of a
stroppy brain fart as his obsession with reclaiming a magical stone
is causing him to have the titty-fits of an irate and unserved
pisshead. So yeah... Overall it's just continuing where we left off
from the first film really.
I feel
it would be hypocritical of me not to criticise this film for
displaying a terminal case of Middle-Film syndrome. As the two
regular readers of this blog/drawn-out suicide note may remember, I
slagged off Hunger Games: Catching Fire
a little while back for not having a proper beginning or conclusion
and this is very much the same. As I said back then, I feel that a
movie should have a proper three-act structure with a satisfying
resolution with the Marvel films being a great example of how to do
that whilst still continuing an over-arching, multi-film narrative.
Having said that... in the case of The Hobbit films
and where this issue is
concerned I personally couldn't give a shiny shite. So to be
objective about it, of course this sequel could be criticised for its
lack of self-containment and having no fucks to give to anybody who
missed part one. However when being subjective I don't mind it at all
because for me the real accomplishment of all of these films is Peter
Jackson's fucking genius ability to build a believable world that's
inhabited by real and likeable characters.
Most
people slagged off the first film because it spent the first of its
many hours in Bilbo's kitchen as he and some dwarves had a fucking
tea party. However this didn't bother me in the slightest as I just
enjoyed losing myself to the beauty of Middle-Earth. Although even if
that wasn't the case, the shitty pacing of the first film is
seriously not a problem for The Desolation Of Smaug which
opens and continues with the break neck speed of a pretty woman
during National Rape Day. For at least the first hour of this film it
feels like it's just set piece after set piece with the floating
barrel sequence being something that everybody seems to be raving
about. Although I of course loved the dwarves trip down the river
rapids for me my favourite sequence was the the Spider attack during
their hallucinogenic stroll through Mirkwoods. You can really tell
that Jackson is a young boy at heart and you can tell that as a young
boy he was probably a mischievous little bastard. He started out
making low budget splatter films and every so often finds an excuse
to go back to that by throwing into his blockbusters a little well
humoured bucket shit and gunk. In the way that this excellent
sequence depicts these eight legged fucks attacking in a more
desaturated environment and with more muted, echoey sounds, I was
very much reminded of the bug attack in Jackson's King
Kong... Although sadly this
lacked the sharp, fanged, cock-ended, Penis Monsters of that other
child-friendly film.
 |
| Freeman here posing with the films budget. |
I
suppose the other thing that needs to be mentioned is obviously the
confrontation between Bilbo and the dragon Smaug considering that's
the set piece that this has all so far been building towards. To
summarise... It's good. Very good in fact. Played by Benedict
Cumberbatch, this is like the most fucked up episode of Sherlock
yet and as such there's almost nothing to complain about it. The
first half of the scene is like an act off as the dragon monologues
like a motherfucker and Martin Freeman reverts back to his days in
The Office when he
turned looking uncomfortable into an art form. Then the second half
is like one of those annoying computer game cutscene where the action
only progresses if you press the right button... Except less annoying
than that because it's not a computer game, you don't have to press a
button and the action is fuck-off great! The design of the dragon is
of course very good although after all the hype, if you were
expecting it to look like anything more than a dragon you might be a
bit disappointed. It's got scales, big wings, breathes fire and sharp
teeth.... The special effects and performance by Cumberbatch are spot
on with Smaug being a really good example of a massive lizardy
bastard.
There
are still a few sub-plots that seem to go nowhere but I guess we'll
need to see the third movie before we completely write them off.
Previously I slagged of the first film for having too many characters
with fat dwarf Bombur not even getting a single line. However
considering that, that is still the case with Part 2 I
guess I was wrong to criticise. It seems that Bombur wasn't neglected
but instead is simply just Middle-Earth's answer to Silent Bob.
Although that retraction is only in the case of him as there are
still definitely too many characters with Bilbo often becoming a
background character in his own film. I understand that there's a lot
of shit going down here but you know... the film is called The
Hobbit so it'd be nice to see a
bit more of him. Especially because with the exception of Mckellen's
Gandalf, Freeman as Bilbo may be the best performance
of all six films... That's a bold claim but I'm sure you'll agree
with it even if Freeman is pitted against the mighty acting chops of
Orlando Bloom. So yeah, these films are technically all going to have
the same problem with their dragged out feel, lack of three acts and
inaccessibility for anybody new to them but you know... fuck it- I'm
happy so who cares? In fact, part of the appeal may even be as a
'wish fulfilment' factor of just living in Middle-Earth as I realise
now that due to their love of home comforts, drinking tea and getting
mashed off a twenty bag of Gandalf's, 'Old Toby', a Hobbit's life
would pretty much be the dream for me.
